She didn't love him and he didn't love her; she was like an addiction, and what they were doing had a darkness to it, a weight.

In some deep place in her heart, Caroline had kept alive the silly romantic notion that somehow David Henry had once known her as no one else ever could. But it was not true. He had never even glimpsed her.

Its impossible to control the reception of your work - the only thing you can control is the experience of writing itself, and the work you create.

It's good to be in love.

Lately, the world felt fragile, like a blown egg, as if it might shatter beneath a careless touch.

...and the distance between them, millimeters only, the space of a breath, opened up and deepened, became a cavern at whose edge he stood.

My first job was in a nursing home - a terrible place in retrospect. It was in an old house, and the residents were so lonely. People rarely visited them. I only stayed there a couple of months, but it made a strong impression on me.